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The Disco Biscuits, Umphrey’s McGee and STS9 Play the 6th Mayan Holidaze

The Disco Biscuits, STS9, Umphrey’s McGee and celebrated the end of the Mayan calender during the 6th annual Mayan Holidaze at the Dreams Tulum Resort & Spa in Tulum, Mexico this past week. Each of the headliners played three shows over the course of 4 days at the all-inclusive resort, which sits in the shadow of the ancient Mayan ruins of Tulum.

The Disco Biscuits kicked off the festival with a two set show on Monday night. The band lived up to the jam part of their “jamtronica” label, bringing a non-stop onslaught of sound throughout the second set, which included a “Rock Candy’ sandwiched between “Strobelights and Martinis.” Fans were also treated to an inverted “Svengali” during set one. STS9, on the other hand, managed to stay pretty much jam free during their first show of the festival. The group played a fairly standard setlist, with the exception of the encore, which consisted of “Satori” followed by “Ramone and Emiglio,” The show also included a cover of Daft Punk’s “Robot Rock” in the first set and a somewhat rare cover King Tubby’s “King Pharaoh’s Dub” (which they call “King Pharaoh’s Tomb”) during set two.

The second day started off with afternoon performances by Lionize and Break Science before Umphrey’s McGee took the stage for their first show of the week. The prog-jammers ended their first set with a debut rendition of Eddie Money’s “Two Tickets to Paradise.” Umphrey’s also brought some holiday cheer to Holidaze when they jammed Mykola Leontovych’s Christmas classic “Carol of the Bells” in the middle of “Mulche’s Odyssey” during set two. The Disco Biscuits once again kept the jams tight on Tuesday night, fitting an inverted “Confrontation” into a first set that literally never stopped. The second set was very much “based” around “Basis for a Day,” with the band jamming in an out of the tune three times before finally finishing at the end of the encore.

Brothers Past got the ball rolling on the main stage as the sun went down on Wednesday. They were followed by STS9, who kicked off their first set with an old school “Frequencies Suite” of “Frequencies DnB 1 > 2 > 3.” The second set included a notable “Hidden Hand, Hidden Fist” segued into “F. Word,” as well as covers of Deee-Lite’s “What is Love?” and the Grateful Dead’s “Shakedown Street.” Umphrey’s McGee started off their performance with an appropriate “There’s No Crying in Mexico.” The first set also saw the appearance of their Tears for Fears/Michael Jackson mash-up “The Way You Rule the World.” Umphrey’s ended things with an encore of “Hangover” sandwiched between “August.”

All three headliners got a one set slot on the main stage for Thursday, the final day of Holidaze 2012. Seeing as there were only a few hours left until the long predicted Mayan Apocalypse, the question on everyone’s mind was the same: “Who will cover R.E.M.‘s “It’s the End of the World as We Know It (And I Feel Fine)?” Fortunately, Umphrey’s cleared things up early in the night when they closed out their first set with their debut of the classic tune. That set also included a rendition of The Police’s “When the World is Running Down You Make the of What’s Still Around” sandwiched between “Miss Tinkle’s Overture.”

Likewise, The Disco Biscuits also threw some “End of the World” lyrics into their “King of the World” opener. Their final show also included half of “Spraypaint” sandwiched between an inverted “Waves,” as well as an inverted “Bernstein and Chasnoff.” As the Biscuits left the stage, everyone waited for the much anticipated midnight 12/21/2012 STS9 performance. The band—which has long had a fascination with Mayan prophecy—had been hyping the show for some time. And while everyone there had a lot of , the setlist was still pretty disappointing for diehard Tribe fans. “Baraka” was the closest thing anyone got to a bust out, and nobody was expecting their long awaited “13th Baktun” show to end with a cover of The Cure’s “The Walk.“Then, Brothers Past offered a fantastic hour long set to close out the main stage.

In addition to four days of amazing music, attendees were also able to pay a little extra for a variety of activities with their favorite artists. These included a Salsa Off judged by Jake Cinninger of Umphrey’s, a Jungle Maya Expedition with Marc Brownstein of the Disco Biscuits, a trip to the Tulum Mayan Ruins with Hunter Brown of STS9 and Snorkel Xtreme with Rick Lowenberg of Brother’s Past. There were also a number of opportunities to give back to the local community through the Positive Legacy non-profit. No matter where you spent your time at Mayan Holidaze, there was always something fun and exciting to be done.

The Disco Biscuits, Umphrey’s McGee and STS9 setlists from Mayan Holidaze 2012 can be viewed below.

Nothing Too Fancy > Willie The Pimp > Anchor Drops, Hajimemashite > 2nd Self, FF1 > Andy’s Last Beer, Glory > Wife Soup, Miss Tinkle’s Overture > When the World Is Running Down You Make the Best of What’s Still Around > Miss Tinkle’s Overture, It’s the End of the World as We Know It (And I Feel Fine)[2]
[1] with drums as power cut out
[2] debut, R.E.M.

I used to love tribe. Jam in the dam 06 was some epic shit. Since then they been stagnant. C’mon boys, this was your chance to blow it up…literally

Feel your pain December 23, 2012, 14:28:17

Tribe has been a stagnant band for multiple years now. I am so disappointed in their shows, at least the biscuits rocked thou

Cheesetep December 23, 2012, 15:59:05

Saw a great tribe show in NOLA back in 2008. Rothbury late night were really amazing too. Last one was in 09 though and I haven’t seen anything better than decent from them since. Very disappointing since they kicked out the “jam” half of jamtronica. Wouldn’t be too bad either if they would at least change the setlist. This super special Mayan apocalypse shows looks like anything they could have played on the last fall tour and that’s not a compliment.

Feel your pain December 23, 2012, 23:22:29

Yep I was at rothbury 09 too, amazing show from tribe and even more amazing festival. That was my last favorite show of them as well, I am not holding my breath for anything special on their upcoming tour or new cd. I’ll still catch them for one of the shows thou since I will always be a fan no matter how shitty they are now haha

doo December 24, 2012, 12:13:33

Vibes this year was a good show… But i agree that they have been stagnant otherwise

Noodles December 25, 2012, 14:09:06

Stagnant… Or perhaps exciting to the young hipsters as us old folks enjoy friends and family life :)
Happy New Years all…